


Custom

by Velvedere



Category: Thor (Movies)
Genre: Alternate Universe, M/M, Pretend Porn, Thor is not a rapist, War Trophy, clever use of foley, warnings for rape that doesn't actually happen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-05-31
Updated: 2014-05-31
Packaged: 2018-01-27 18:16:48
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,566
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1718864
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Velvedere/pseuds/Velvedere
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>In the aftermath of war, it's custom for Asgardian victors to exert their dominance over their enemies. But Thor doesn't want to.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Custom

In the night, torches cast the camp in stark shadows. Points of deep orange flame burned subtleties of color away, leaving only black and the glow of their light.

Thor moved through the tents and crude forges on grim steps. He swept his eyes across the dark, picking out the hunched figures in cloaks around pits where fires burned. Though they were Asgardian soldiers, the stoop of their postures and fur lined cloaks made their silhouettes but beasts before the firelight, growling and grunting and howling their laughter and songs as they guzzled drink. Sank their teeth into meat.

The Lady Sif stood guard at his tent, spear in hand.

She bowed her head to his approach.

“Lady Sif.”

“My lord.”

“How fare the men?”

“Well, my lord. They’ll be celebrating until dawn.”

That gave Thor reason to smile, though it faded quickly. It was a well earned victory. At last the armies of Jotunheim were driven back. Asgard and all the Realms could enjoy peace for a time.

“Is all prepared?”

“Yes, my lord,” Sif nodded. “He’s waiting inside.”

Thor looked to the line of guards stationed around the tent’s border. All of them grim-faced, gazing longingly at the celebration fires and smells of the feast.

They would have their time soon.

Sif watched Thor’s hesitation.

“Thor.” She lowered her voice. Stepped closer to him. “You do not have to do this.”

“It is expected,” said Thor.

Sif pressed her lips together, and would have put a hand on his shoulder had there been not so many others to see. Still, her sympathy shone in her eyes, and Thor nodded. Grateful.

“Keep watch,” he said, and parted the tent flaps to duck inside.

Two guards stood within, the prisoner between them. Thor dismissed them with a wave of his hand.

“Leave us.”

The guards were understandably reluctant to release their hold on the prisoner’s chains, but a warning look from Thor sent them away. They did not dare defy him twice.

The prisoner sat cross-legged on a pile of furs and blankets meant to be a bed. Shackles linked by chains carved with intricate runes kept his wrists and ankles bound close together. A similarly engraved gag circled his jaw. Red eyes sharp as daggers glared out over the muzzle, framed by a fall of black hair and the graceful blue marks of a frost giant.

When Thor had first spotted him across the battlefield, he’d taken the slender figure to be a woman.

He sat now unafraid, meeting Thor’s eyes in immediate defiance.

Once the guards had gone, Thor crossed the space between them.

He reached out, and released the clasps on the muzzle.

The prisoner exhaled a soft breath as the gag slipped away from his skin, perhaps in relief. He drew his tongue along his lips, wetting them, while the hate in his eyes burned.

“You are certain that’s wise?” he said, in a voice deceptively soft. Smooth as wine.

“No,” said Thor. He moved away from him. He placed the gag upon a chest well out of the way.

“Then why?”

“I cannot speak to you otherwise.”

“Speak?” The prisoner tilted his head. Suspicion and murderous intent laced the lines of his features. In places he still bore the bruises and marks of battle. “Is that why you’ve come?”

Thor didn’t answer. He shrugged off his cloak and hung it on a peg near the entrance. The interior of the tent was furnished for royalty with what luxuries could be afforded on the battlefront. Dark wooden furniture and the glow of a fireless light. It was warm, and still, and private.

“Do you know who I am?” Thor asked.

“I know who you are.” The front giant sniffed, turning up his nose in disdain. “Only a fool would not know Asgard’s golden prince.”

He all but spat the words.

“You are Loki. You lead the armies of Jotunheim.”

“So you know me as well. Should I be flattered?” He shifted his seat, making the chains slither and rattle. “Though a more proper tense would be to say ‘did’ lead the armies of Jotunheim, before you so graciously decimated them for me.”

Thor’s face did not change as he returned his look. Even in his shackles, Loki’s posture did not concede the defeat his people had suffered. He was proud. Defiant to the end.

“I am not here to gloat.”

“Oh, of course not.” Loki uncurled his fingers, making a gesture as best he could. “You’re here for an entirely different matter. Shall we get on with it, then? How will you have me? From behind? Or perhaps beneath you, the better to see me squirm?”

Thor shook his head.

“You misunderstand.”

“Do enlighten me, my gracious lord.”

“I do not wish to...”

“Do not wish to what?” Loki leaned forward, sneering. “It is the way of your people, is it not? A battle, properly won. Prisoners to do with as you please. It’s a custom for royalty to fuck the leaders of those they have conquered. A display of your power. Your dominance.” He hissed through his teeth. A sound like snapping ice. “Or whatever you tell yourself so you do not see the tears when you close your eyes at night.”

“You misunderstand,” Thor said again, his words a mumble. He did not wish the guards standing just beyond the tent walls to hear. “This battle was not to conquer. We only meant to defend the Realms. Your armies had invaded—”

“Lands that were ours to begin with,” Loki snapped. He sighed, settled back, shrugging one shoulder in seeming nonchalance. “But that hardly matters anymore, does it? Diplomacy had its chance.” Then, in the same breath: “How many of my people have your soldiers raped already?”

“I have given orders for your people to be treated fairly. No harm will come to them.”

“Oh, and for your mercy I am truly grateful.” Loki made a mockery of a groveling motion. “Do you expect me to allow you use of my mouth for that? I warn you: anything you put between my teeth you shall be quickly parted from.”

He grinned savagely. Thor felt a wrenching in his stomach and turned away, sickened.

Would that he could breathe cooler air now, beyond the light of the campfires.

“I know of your sorcery,” he said, finding solace at least in a low wooden stool. He moved to sit upon it. “I saw what your magic could do in battle. All speak of your wicked tongue.” He met Loki’s eyes beneath a fall of his hair, yet unwashed. “None of the tales quite do you justice.”

“It was you who decided to remove my muzzle.”

Thor nodded, and drew a breath. He held it and felt himself ease as he leaned forward on the stool, hands upon his knees. He looked to a spot of rug upon the ground. Traced the intricate pattern with his eyes.

“I take none against their will,” he muttered.

“But you will slaughter them on a battlefield?”

“Your forces were armed, and as capable of killing as defending themselves. This...” Thor gestured to him. The chains. The thin robes he had been dressed in as opposed to the armor he had worn into battle. If possible, they made his appearance that much more slender. “You are defenseless.”

“Oh. Am I?” Loki arched one dark eyebrow. He leaned back on the blankets and furs, parting his legs suggestively. The slit in the robes ran the length of his thigh.

Thor looked away.

“And if I said I did want it?”

“I would not believe you.”

“If I said I was drawn to you the moment I first set my sights upon you? That I saw you across the battlefield, golden and glistening with the blood of my people, and I was overcome with the urge to drag my fingers through your hair. Claw your skin and taste the water as it washed the lingering traces of battle from your body. That you appeared to me as this powerful, foreign thing. I wanted to claim that power for my own. Conquer and take you. Exact my revenge as I satisfied my lust.”

Thor remained unmoved.

“I would still not believe you.”

Loki shrugged. He turned his gaze aside, indifferent where he had been seductive only a moment before. Every part of him turned on the edge of a blade.

“Quite a predicament you’re in, then. Your people expect you to soil yourself with a filthy frost giant body to show Asgard’s domination over Jotunheim – who knows where it’s even been? – and you will not comply.” He tsked. “A sorry shape for the future king.”

Thor sighed, more grave than ever.

He leaned further forward, clasped hands cupped to his lips.

“I do not know what to do,” he murmured to no one.

But Loki heard, and tilted his head. As suggestion had turned to indifference, it now turned to curiosity.

“There is a solution...”

Thor looked up. The barest glimmer of hope dared flicker in his eyes. Though he remained wary.

Loki nodded his head toward the tent flaps.

“There are guards posted outside, yes?”

“Yes,” said Thor.

“They cannot hear us now.”

“So long as we keep our voices low.”

“So let us make them believe you did what you came here to do.” Loki’s grin returned, sly and sharp in the light. “They do not have to see us perform the act.”

Thor frowned, and shook his head.

“I have told you. I will not—”

“You do not have to.” Loki rose to his knees, gesturing with his shackled hands. “If we are loud, they will hear us. They need only _think_ we are doing what they expect of us. Nothing travels faster than the words of rumors. Trust me in this.”

Thor’s frown deepened. He looked to the tent flaps. He thought of Sif and the guards just beyond. He did not wish them to think ill of him, that he would be the sort of man to take another without their consent. But the alternative would risk rebellion. The remnants of Jotunheim would think the future king of Asgard weak. There could be uprisings. More lives lost when they could be spared. And it was custom.

Thor scratched a hand back through his hair, and bitterly hated custom.

Loki ended Thor’s dilemma for him by abruptly picking up a half-full cup of drink from the floor – the guards had been helping themselves to what they could snatch of the victory celebration – and hurling it across the tent.

The cup sailed over Thor’s head and smashed into a standing mirror. Thor ducked on instinct, and looked, wide-eyed, as metal shards and drink slid slowly down the shattered glass.

“Unhand me, you brute!” Loki shouted, snarling the words with a show of teeth.

Thor stared, uncomprehending for several long moments, as he was nowhere near enough to touch him.

Loki gestured emphatically, and understanding took hold.

“I...err...hold still, you Jotun...rogue?” He raised his voice loud enough to be heard, though his delivery felt less than convincing.

Loki rolled his eyes.

Then he flung himself back across the furs, one arm dramatically over his brow.

“No...no! I will not submit to you! Never!”

And kicked over the rest of the pitcher of drink to make it clatter, along with a tray of food.

Thor looked around. He grabbed a handful of pillows piled near the bedheap and threw them against the wall. They made no noise, but the flutter of movement would be sure to be seen.

“Silence, prisoner!”

“No! No, you mustn’t! I couldn’t possibly—!”

“You will and you shall!”

“But the sheer size of you!”

What followed was a wild and raucous thrashing of the tent’s complete interior.

Thor had not been so destructive with furniture since he was a boy, when he would tie sheets to his bedposts and pretend to captain his own ship. He would strike chairs and chests with a wooden sword, slaying dragons left and right. It was a strange memory to summon, cavorting about the tent. Shouting responses to Loki’s prompts. Kicking and tossing and growling and grunting.

But it was also a fond memory.

And, despite it all, Thor felt himself smile.

The whole thing was rather quite...fun.

“Please, stop! No more!”

“I am not nearly finished with you yet!”

“No!”

They lay exhausted on the blankets afterward, panting for breath. Thor watched as goosedown floated through the air from a torn pillow. He was smiling, brushing feathers from his lashes, as Loki laughed.

Loki had torn his robes at some point. Messed and tangled his hair in all directions.

For effect, he’d said.

Thor looked to him now, his hands coming to rest on his chest, and could not help a deeper smile.

“That was,” he said, murmuring low. Careful. “The most ridiculous thing I have ever done.”

Loki snickered, just over a breath. He lifted a hand to his mouth, drawing the other after it, and stretched long and languid. Sweat beaded on their brows.

To be shackled, he was still surprisingly mobile.

Were it not for the guards outside and the runes that bound his magic, Thor did not doubt Loki could have easily slipped away.

“Was it so difficult?” Loki hummed, seeming pleased with himself.

Thor watched him, for awhile quiet.

He could hear the guards murmuring outside.

“What will happen now?” he whispered.

Loki hummed, and rolled onto his side, curling up comfortably. Feathers settled upon him like snow.

“That depends on you. What have you done with your prisoners in the past?”

“I...” Thor faltered. He looked down at his hands. “I have had none.”

“Oh?” Loki’s lips curled into a smile. “Is that so?”

He lifted his head to prop in one hand, though the shackles made it awkward. “Well, you could turn me over to imprisonment with the others, to serve whatever punishment we are sentenced. Or you could take me back to Asgard with you as your personal trophy, to keep and play with until you’re stuffed and bored.”

“I will not take you by force,” Thor repeated, to which Loki laughed.

“Of course not. That is why I will guilt and charm you into deciding to take me back. If you do, I can wheedle my way into your heart, gain your trust, and usurp Asgard from within, without any fear of being harmed in return. A brilliant way to take revenge, for certain.”

Thor frowned. He watched him very carefully.

“I...do not know whether to believe you, or...”

“I could be lying.” Loki shrugged one slender, half-bared shoulder. “Or I could not. It really is up to you.”

Thor thought for a long while. He did not doubt Loki’s rage, nor the hate with which he had regarded him when he first came into the tent.

But he did doubt his conviction.

Perhaps it was a useless hope, but Thor could imagine – even for an instant – that there was more to this clever being than malice and deceit. Perhaps, given time, he could uncover more beyond that crimson gaze. Coax it out into the light.

Perhaps he had already made his decision.

“I hope you find Asgard tolerable,” he said quietly.

“Oh,” said Loki as he smiled. He nodded. “I think I will.”


End file.
